The only photo that proves I was ever in a restaurant kitchen. I loved those shoes even though they barely had any traction.

Beef, jalapenos, rice. Family meal was unusual at this restaurant because it would happen AFTER the shift, instead of before.

Each 賄い makanai was $1 out of our paychecks, and the chefs took turns to cook it. We had to write our names on a sign-up sheet by a certain time (11 am or 4 pm depending on lunch/dinner).

Family meal would be cooked when the customer flow slowed down, and plates were assigned by writing names on strips of paper or masking tape (used for labeling items in the kitchen). Occasionally the tape would be drowned in sauce. I would just fish it out and continue eating.

This meal is pretty typical: the shrimp and vegetables that were already part of the menu, but cooked in whatever easy sauce the chef decided on.

Fried noodles and steak. This happened a lot, and was also quite greasy. The spicy mayo sauce was pretty good at cutting the grease but wasn't exactly healthy, either

In the background you can see bundles of clean red napkins, covered in plastic by the laundry company. On the right are red/white paper crowns folded by servers, meant for customers with birthdays.

Cleaning shrimp for the teppan side.

This was the side salad for basically every entree on the menu, and the default vegetable for family meal. You'll see this salad and ginger sauce a lot.

Tortilla chip rounds from Trader Joe's (it was next door), and shrimp ceviche.

Chicken tonkatsu. I liked the spicy mayo sauce (upper left) but it's sooo not diet food there's so much mayonnaise

An outside food ingredient: just regular hotdogs instead of Chinese sausage, unfortunately.

Grilled chicken thigh.

Late lunch (or early dinner), just before the dinner shift starts.

Sometimes we would all go out after work, and even people not on shift would come out for dinner.

After clocking out, some of us would go to the bar to use our staff discount, especially on days when happy hour applied.

A host and a teppan chef at happy hour.

Leftover California roll. I worked on the sushi bar side of the restaurant, and never at the teppan side. I don't know, I guess I just wasn't teppan waitress material? The sushi chefs would put aside leftover (or "leftover") bits to share with the sushi bar servers. My favorite happened once in a blue moon: grilled salmon skin.

Green onion and wasabi noodles for the sushi bar servers. The restaurant made us clock out before counting out the till (totally illegal), so we would eat our snacks while counting out because hey, we're not getting paid anyway.

The kitchen island. One of the chefs has their containers out from their teppan cart, to refill. The tall containers are the ginger sauce and spicy mayo sauce, and you can see that I have drowned my meal in that tasty, tasty, spicy mayo. (People would come in just to buy the sauces, especially the spicy mayo. It was $6/bottle, around 500 mL.)

The small containers contain butter and lemon halves, for use at the teppan.

Teppan chicken and fried rice. Lots of spicy mayo, again. Some days, we had a LOT of fried rice. In this photo, I have been given fried rice on the plate AND in a side bowl. I always ate everything. That youthful metabolism really was something else.

Sometimes we had special meals with ingredients from outside the restaurant! This was a Japanese restaurant, so there weren't any tortilla chips on hand. The tortilla chips were probably from Trader Joe's next door.

Some green chilis for flavor.

Taking a break from folding paper hats and cloth napkins. I was taught how to fold the paper hats a couple of times, but I never got around to making them often enough to properly learn.

Lots and lots of cloth napkins. I spent a lot of time folding these!

Sometimes the servers got bored during their lunch break and ended up folding a variety of paper hats.

Not the teppan restaurant, but nearby. It's a taco truck parked outside McDonalds, with the aproned McDonalds kitchen staff eating at the truck.

One of the morning prep staff. He would leave after the lunch shift started filtering in at around 10:30 am. I only ever saw him for 5 or 10 minutes at a time.

Dressed up in a borrowed employee kimono for Halloween, and doing prep work with steak. He won the Halloween costume competition.

The fun busboy jumped in for a photo.

This was the food that the chef was portioning out. I saved my rice from being drowned in soup by bringing a bowl.

Salmon soup

More salmon

A busboy being trained to be a teppan chef. Frying the vegetables, teppan-style, for family meal after the dinner shift.

Freshly cooked teppan vegetables from the busboy's training! It tasted correct.

The meals did got monotonous whenever it was exactly like the teppan menu.

And again...

Hong Kong-style lunch (according to the HK chef).

I don't know what possessed someone to buy and grill short ribs, because this wasn't something that the restaurant had on-hand. It was fantastic and never happened again.

Sept 29: mystery pork stew.

Again, on Oct 06.

Eating lunch in the kitchen.

He joked to me that he was signing away his life, but wouldn't say what it was. It wasn't for a different job because he had been there for years, and he was still working there when I left a few months later.

Stir-fried noodles and a fish stew.

Stir-fried noodles with beef.

Eating lunch in the private dining room. Most of our lunches were wherever we were out of the customers' line of sight. Sometimes that was on the far end of the main dining room, but on a busy day it would be further away, in the private dining room.

The giant pots were used for cooking in the kitchen, and then they were placed on the (cold) teppan surface for us to serve ourselves.

A mysterious dinner! What's this, a burrito?

Oh ... it's just tortilla-wrapped teppan food plus guacamole.

Tonkatsu and spicy mayo.

Spicy mayo slathered all over fried rice and teppan chicken.

Tonkatsu, rice, and a salmon soup.

Something a little different! Barbecue chicken.

Pork stew and house salad.

Japanese curry. I never liked it but ate it anyway.

Lunch in the private dining room.

Family meal on the kitchen island.

The cool assistant manager (he used to be a busboy so he knew what was up) with his necktie removed after clocking out. The guys would instantly take off their neckties after clocking out.

Nearby, the busboy filled the water pitchers for the last few tables.

This was basically straight from the teppan menu again. If you take a good look, there's a bit of everything: beef, chicken, salmon, shrimp. Usually, the staff only got one type of meat.

Teppan fried noodles and ... guacamole?

Beef and shrimp in a tomato sauce, with white rice AND fried rice.

A second photo of the same meal.

Something different! Orange chicken.

Staff dinner at a late-night restaurant, after our restaurant closed for the night.

Enjoying the last of the lunch break, just before the early dinner customers start coming in.

The kitchen.